The weather in the Sea of Undead remained as capricious as ever. It had been clear skies when they arrived, but after less than half a day's turmoil, the heavens were already choked with dark clouds. Those rain clouds, stained a deep crimson verging on purple, drifted over slowly, accompanied by the dull rumble of thunder, unleashing a torrential downpour. That rain, just like the Sea of Undead itself, carried a distinctly sanguine odor. Likely, another undead creature had perished, its vital essence absorbed and thus integrated into the sea in this manner.

I was suddenly reminded of the last time it rained in the Sea of Undead. After that heavy storm, everything had transformed; the sea was no longer a mere lake but a truly boundless ocean, trapping us in the center with no discernible path back. The landscape and structures on the shore seemed to have scaled up proportionally, and the boundaries encircling the lake had stretched in equal measure.

Now, here on solid ground, a similar tempest of bloody wind and rain was raging. After this storm subsided, I couldn't predict what changes the reality before us would undergo, and whether finding a way back would even remain a possibility.

Xiao Shu walked to the mouth of the cave, gazing at the vertical sheets of rain pouring off the cliff face, and sighed, “In this downpour, where could she possibly be sheltering?”

“Huh?” I thought I must have misheard, uncertain whether he meant he or she, and leaned in with my ears perked. “What did you say? Who is this he (she) you’re referring to?”

Xiao Shu didn’t answer, merely turning to give me a serious, direct stare before walking over to Xing’er and pulling off his own outer jacket to drape over the boy. The Ghost Infant had no body heat; when Xing’er had bitten someone earlier, I had desperately yanked at his earlobe, and a chilling coldness had radiated through my fingers. He truly had no warmth! Xiao Shu had been bitten by him so many times, and had even been so physically close to him, there was no reason he shouldn't know Xing’er was different from ordinary people. Yet, at this precise moment, he was letting the boy endure the chill carried by the deluge alone, bestowing his only jacket upon Xing’er. Perhaps, somewhere in his heart lay a wound that could only be soothed by nurturing this child as if he were normal.

“Uncle Ming, what is that?” My contemplation of Xiao Shu’s uncharacteristic action was interrupted by A Li’s young voice.

“What is it?” I followed the direction of her pointed finger.

Outside the mountain cave, amidst the ceaseless sheets of blood-tinged rain, countless dark, egg-sized objects were moving in formation, inching along the ground at the base of the cliff where the rain hadn't reached, scuttling toward the entrance. They resembled ants in a long file, except these ants were slightly larger and their abdomens a bit plumper. Occasionally, one or two would be touched by a stray drop of rain, immediately flipping onto their backs, their six legs stiffly splayed in the mud.

“Spiders…” I exclaimed, the sound startling Xiao Shu, who had been standing beside me in a daze. He instantly rushed over, following A Li’s gaze. Both sides of the cliff base were already overrun with a dense carpet of spiders. They had organized themselves into two long, neat lines, like beads threaded together, moving from south to north and north to south, closing in on the cave entrance. They looked poised to swarm inside at any moment.

“You don’t think they’ve come to seek revenge, do you?” I scooped up A Li and retreated deeper into the cave, staring helplessly at Xiao Shu.

“They’re probably just seeking shelter from the rain,” Xiao Shu replied, backing in as well and moving toward Xing’er to try and unfasten the iron chain shackled to the boy’s foot. “Look, the spiders hit by the rain died instantly, just as if they’d been doused with water from the Sea of Undead.”